In This Edition

  • Legislative Update
  • Rainy Day Fund
  • New Maps Released

Helpful Links

Legislation Tracker

Monitor bills and topics in the legislature at the Wisconsin Bill Tracker website.

Legislative Update

Last week the Senate passed my bill which ends the practice of individuals being denied organ transplants based on their disability. The life of a person isn't worthless because they have a disability,yet that is exactly the message that is being sent when they are told they are not worthy to receive a life-saving organ transplant. I'm hopeful the Assembly will take this bill up quickly and send it to the Governor for his signature so no more lives are lost due to outdated ways of thinking.

 SB 614 requires the Department of Natural Resources to create a biennial work plan to set priorities and goals for lands they manage. It should be a simple request that would help the Legislature make spending decisions every two years. The bill passed earlier today and now awaits a vote by the Assembly.

SB 587 passed out of the Senate Committee on Education. The bill allows parents to transfer their student to another school based on the requirements for masking or vaccine. This transfer exemption works both ways, it allows a student to transfer away from schools with requirements to one that doesn't have them or from a school without requirements to one that does. It is important for parents to have the full range of choice when finding the best school for their kids.

Additionally, the bill clarifies that when the student transfers, they receive an exemption to the WIAA transfer rules for athletes in their junior or senior years. 

 

 

Rainy Day Fund

Thanks to common sense budgeting, our state has yet again ended another fiscal year with a surplus. The "Rainy Day Fund" has  increased to $1.73 billion! It's the largest its ever been and five times larger than it was just two short years ago. We've accomplished this without cutting schools funding and passing tax breaks for working class families.

New Maps Released

 

Every ten years, the U.S. Census Bureau publishes updated information reflecting changes in the population since the previous census. This information is used by states to redraw local, legislative, and congressional districts so that each district has approximately the same number of people.  

The Wisconsin State Legislature, according to our constitutional and statutory duty, has undertaken this task with requests for additional input from numerous public advocacy groups, including the ‘People’s Maps Commission’, and Wisconsinites from across the state. The new district maps introduced today are the next step towards crafting final districts which meet every criteria required by state law, the U.S. Supreme Court, Wisconsin Supreme Court, and the Constitutions of the United States of America and the State of Wisconsin.

This is the first time the public has been able to submit maps directly to the Legislature for consideration. This new opportunity gave any Wisconsin resident the ability to draw their own statewide map, regional plan, or community of interest (COIs) through the DrawYourDistrictWisconsin.com website.

The people of Wisconsin want transparency, they want checks and balances, and they want cooperation in how their districts are drawn. The Legislature took into account plans submitted from citizens all over the state and considered submissions from the governor’s People’s Maps Commission, so we are confident these maps are fair for all Wisconsinites.

With the introduction of the maps as legislation, Wisconsinites will now have the opportunity to thoroughly review and give comment on congressional districts, state senate districts, and state assembly districts as part of the public hearing process. That additional input will continue the open, transparent process as bills move through the Legislature.   

The Legislature made it very clear through Senate Joint Resolution 63 that the criteria used to create maps are consistent with the traditional and legal frameworks that guide redistricting. The transparent efforts to engage the public and enshrine our intent through an official action of the Legislature is designed to give everyone in Wisconsin confidence in the process and additional opportunity for unprecedented public input.

For further information on the history of redistricting in Wisconsin, the non-partisan Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau (LRB) published an in-depth guide explaining the law, principles, and process.

LRB analysis of State Legislative Districts

For the LRB analysis of Congressional Districts